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For ‘New’ Broadway, Mixed Reviews
Principled or penny-pinching, some students shun ‘chain' gang
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Business New Haven
4/15/2002
By: E. A. Linden
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National clothing retailer Urban Outfitters opened its doors on Broadway in New Haven on March 30, 2001. The opening was the latest move in an extensive Broadway redevelopment campaign launched by Yale University Properties that has also brought J. Crew, Origins and a host of other smaller upscale shops to the once-funky retail district.
The Urban Outfitters opening was greeted by a mixed reception from students, ranging from delight to outright condemnation.
A sampling of responses in the two undergraduate-run student newspapers at Yale, the Yale Daily News and the Yale Herald, reflect student wariness of big business and chain stores generally with such headlines as “Broadway Redevelopment, Or Why I Got Hives,” (YDN, October 29, 1999) or “Trendoid Cesspool Won't Fit In” (Yale Herald, February 9, 2001)
Student sentiment in many cases was colored by staunch loyalty to stores either relocated from Broadway or closed outright by the redevelopment.
One such example is Krauszer's, the 24-hour mini-mart/deli that was in easy walking distance of the campus near York and Elm. Despite the fact that Krauszer's “fulfills Yale student needs very well,” according to an unsigned editorial in the Yale Daily News in September 2000, University Properties did not renew the market's lease in favor of bringing a new tenant, Gourmet Heaven, to the space.
The editorial called awarding the all-night munchies monopoly to Gourmet Heaven a “serious gamble” because of the perceived potential for high cost and shift in products away from traditional late-night snack foods. Students who smoke were also alienated by the move when they were told that the new convenience store would not carry cigarettes, redirecting smokers to local bars or the Shell station on Whalley for their evening fix.
The Gourmet Heaven “gamble” is still being played out. Justifying student wariness of a store with “gourmet” in its name, the new market carries a greater variety of foods at prices higher than its predecessor's. Further, the foot-long Krauszer's deli sandwich, a staple of Yalies' late-night diets, cannot be found at Gourmet Heaven, whose nearest equivalent is a gyro.
Many students are quick to note also that while greater gastronomical selection is in principle a benefit over Krauszer's, the typical student budget does not necessarily allow for late-night runs on Petit Écolier or sushi. Asked how he thought prices compared between Krauszer's and Gourmet Heaven, Yale senior Eric P. Brown replied, “I don't know. I don't go into Gourmet Heaven on principle.”
His response typifies the attitude of many students. Kristina Weaver, a junior, says that she never uses the all-night market. “At first I felt uncomfortable about its yuppie image, but now I don't have any political feelings about it. I just don't really go there.”
But there are students who appreciate the new, enhanced offerings. Says freshman Leila Rastegar: “I'm really happy we have [Gourmet Heaven]. They have more selection than Durfee's [the Yale-run on-campus store] at the same price.”
Senior Laura Smolowe agrees. “I appreciate the selection at Gourmet Heaven, although I wouldn't necessarily say it is healthier,” she says. “They don't have tofu, for example, and it is certainly more expensive than Krauzer's [was] without carrying normal 'all-night' foods. They have more exotic things at the expense of Doritos.”
While students almost universally cite price as the main criticism of Gourmet Heaven and some other new stores on Broadway, student dissent has subsided a bit. A year after the “anchor” stores (J. Crew, Urban Outfitters) and smaller upscale shops opened their doors, a search of this year's student newspapers yield far fewer articles about the Broadway changes, certainly none with the virulence of the early pieces that began appearing in 1998 with the eviction of another student staple, the Daily Caffé and continuing into 2000.
It seems that now that if students are expressing their pleasure or discontent with the district's new personality, they are doing so with their wallets.
Andrea Pizzicone of Yale University Properties is quick to explain that the new stores are performing at or above expectations. (On its opening day J. Crew reported sales 400 percent above projections.) Since then, the stores are unwilling to disclose sales figures, although Vince, the men's department manager at Urban Outfitters (who would not disclose his last name), says that his store has “definitely surpassed its target for this year,” with “steady sales.”
Is that equally true of older businesses that might capitalize on a loyal existing customer base as well as the influx of new shoppers? Explains Phil Cutler, owner of Cutler's Records, Tapes & CDs, “Business has gone up now that people are starting to come since the construction is done.”
However, perhaps the most useful barometer of the redevelopment's success comes not from early sales figures but by measuring traffic.
“The way we've been trying to get statistics is through parking [statistics],” University Properties' Pizzicone explains, measuring the number of shoppers drawn to Broadway from the suburban market. “Evidently there's been a spike in parking weekends and evenings.”
Pizzicone asserts that University Properties goal is simply to “meet Yale students needs,” while simultaneously creating a shopping district that does not flag when school is not in session.
“Usually in the past when students have left for the summer, stores lose 30 percent of their business, and that actually did not happen [last summer],” Pizzicone explains. Gourmet Heaven is but one example of University Properties' solution to serving student need while maintaining a caliber of store that would be attractive to day visitors to New Haven.
Broadway is just one component of the citywide redevelopment effort driven by Yale University. The formula of bringing national chain stores as anchors to support the growth of small local businesses is soon to be implemented on lower Chapel Street as well, with published reports that the university is courting chain retailers such as Crate & Barrel and the Pottery Barn for the block between College and Temple streets, which it now owns.
Chapel Square Mall is also currently slated for an overhaul that would take anywhere from two to four years for completion, depending on longstanding legal issues. Using the template of Broadway as a model for growth in the rest of the city, Bruce Alexander, Yale's vice president in the Office of New Haven and State affairs, says, “We want to see the rest of the downtown do that well.”
For now, students are taking the changes in stride and looking forward to what comes next. As senior David Sproule explains, “I wouldn't mind a few more options.”
BNH editorial intern E.A. Linden is a senior in Yale's Morse College.
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